2012 IndyCar silly season

[JagtechOhio]

Frankenwaggon?

[Paradise City]

Dallankenstein......


sorry.

[JagtechOhio]

I like yours better.
Dallankenstein it is!

[mountainstar]

Originally Posted by JagtechOhio

Frankenwaggon?

CrappinFrankenWaggonBigButtDraggin

[mountainstar]

Originally Posted by mountainstar

The whole Truecar thing there is reason to be skeptical as basically it's an internet startup that is running on a $200 million dollar blob of financing. There are already similar companies or options out there, so we will see if they are able to create success out of what they have.

Guess I wasn't too far off the mark:

http://www.autoblog.com/2012/01/06/s...at-on-truecar/

"What exactly is TrueCar? That's the question behind recent conflicts between the company and a growing list of foes, which include dealership organizations, automakers and regulators in at least three states."

[Jimmy Magnusson]

Originally Posted by mountainstar

Guess I wasn't too far off the mark:

http://www.autoblog.com/2012/01/06/s...at-on-truecar/

"What exactly is TrueCar? That's the question behind recent conflicts between the company and a growing list of foes, which include dealership organizations, automakers and regulators in at least three states."

Now that sounds exactly like the type of business that I would like to associate myself with. Just after I get done chatting with Scott Tucker.

[GTRMagic]

I guess this is one way to pack up the old Dallaras and keep them out of the way at AA..

[Canada ALMS fan]

^Wow!!! Even if they sold those for pennies on the dollar that is still a ton of capital tied up, even though sponsors paid for them. Surely a couple must have some collector value??

[kurski]

Canada’s Paul Tracy is still seeking a full time job in IndyCar for the 2012 season. He has said he would not race another part-time schedule as he has the past three seasons. But IndyCar insider Curt Cavin at the Indianapolis Star reported that there are no offers for the 2003 Champ Car champion to do all the races. “I think PT would take a half-season ride over nothing unless the sponsorship he has requires a full-season commitment,” Cavin said.

[Jacques Rabbit]

That'd be a hell of a sponsor, eh? "We require a full-season, but we're only going to pay for half of it."

[Razzzor]

It's crazy Bourdais not even getting a drive, he'd easily be in the top 5 drivers in Indycar (probably Dixon, Franchitti, Wilson, Power, Bourdais right now).

I hope Cunningham gets another shot this year - there's so many other random drivers who have barely done a thing that seem to have got drives. Apart from Simona who's really proven herself imo, none of the other girls should be in the field, including Danica.

Finally, why is everyone going about Indycars being so bad and next to dead? The field is huge, there's tonnes of teams, the racing is as good as ever. The races are probably more entertaining now than they were in the 90s. Pre-merge is when it really sucked, with half the good drivers still in Champcar and a small field.

If the attendance and tv ratings are down, then it needs to be promoted better, firstly. And I think it needs more popular drivers. Does anyone actually like Franchitti at all? I don't, he's a moaner ******. And American's aren't going to love racers that aren't American ie Power, Dixon, Servia, Briscoe, Sato... who's the best American right now - Hunter-Reay? He's overrated and Rahal, Andretti, Castro-Neves just don't seem to have it (anymore in Helio's case). The series losing Danica will probably make a big difference, negatively. Even if she is completely overrated the fans love her.

[marcostraz]

Originally Posted by Razzzor

Finally, why is everyone going about Indycars being so bad and next to dead? The field is huge, there's tonnes of teams, the racing is as good as ever. The races are probably more entertaining now than they were in the 90s. Pre-merge is when it really sucked, with half the good drivers still in Champcar and a small field.

I'm totally agree...

[Jacques Rabbit]

With all due respect, the Americans will only support American drivers theory has never actually been proven to be accurate. People will always warm up to big personalities, whether they are heroes or villains. More will support a guy like Wheldon or Power or Hinchcliffe than an American who completely lacks a personality (in my opinion, none of the ones in IndyCar at the moment have much of one; Newgarden and Hildebrand to some extent). They also won't care about Americans if they aren't winning.

Reality is that Hélio Castroneves won a show decided largely on fan voting among Americans. Why? Personality. Everyone wants to write us off as a bunch of xenophobes, but if we really were, F1 wouldn't get higher TV ratings than a typical IndyCar race, our favorite ice hockey and baseball players wouldn't be foreigners, and we would have all flocked to the IRL to see Bradley "Buzz" Calkins.

1) The sport is trying to be mainstream, but the mainstream consistently rejects it. Because it is trying to be mainstream, it is alienating the already small niche it had to exploit, and is now a niche within a niche.

2) Not sold on the new car, and definitely not sold on the integrity of the selection process.

3) Car counts are up, but that's because teams are subsidized by IndyCar.

4) IndyCar has still never turned a profit.

5) The sport's direction doesn't exist. It's just do whatever whenever. They are in no position to make a future plan, but if they don't, there is no future. They just pick up whatever scraps and make spur-of-the-moment decisions. There is no identity in IndyCar.

I don't want to be Debbie Downer but perception is reality, and few are perceiving this series as anything positive.

[Razzzor]

From my perspective Wheldon and Kanaan have probably been the two most popular non-American drivers, although if Wheldon never won his title and the 500, he'd be long forgotten by now. And Kanaan fizzled out. I could be wrong... how popular are Franchitti and Dixon over there? Hard to tell when your from NZ.

Helio was big in his day, but he's getting slaughtered by Power now.

I think both F1 and Indycar need a massively popular American driver to get more interest... when you compare it to Nascrap. Look at how popular Earnhardt Jr is, a guy than can barely win races. No driver in Indycar comes close to his popularity. And there's plenty more Nascrap drivers that are almost household names. Castro-Neves isn't a household name.

[GTRMagic]

While all of this anti-ChampCar discussion may be interesting to some, sadly I am not sure it falls under the heading of the 2012 Silly Season.

Perhaps some new threads suggesting 'wouldn't it be good if' instead of 'the sky is falling' might generate some new conversation on the subject at hand, and perhaps improve the sport overall....

[mountainstar]

Originally Posted by Razzzor

From my perspective Wheldon and Kanaan have probably been the two most popular non-American drivers, although if Wheldon never won his title and the 500, he'd be long forgotten by now. And Kanaan fizzled out. I could be wrong... how popular are Franchitti and Dixon over there? Hard to tell when your from NZ.

Helio was big in his day, but he's getting slaughtered by Power now.

I think both F1 and Indycar need a massively popular American driver to get more interest... when you compare it to Nascrap. Look at how popular Earnhardt Jr is, a guy than can barely win races. No driver in Indycar comes close to his popularity. And there's plenty more Nascrap drivers that are almost household names. Castro-Neves isn't a household name.

Almost no one outside of Indianapolis and a few motor racing nerds that read Autosport and Motorsport, has any idea who dixon or franchitti are as people, drivers or anything about their history. And the same would have applied to Dan Wheldon or kanaan as well. When Dan Wheldon died, almost no one in the public had any idea who he was or that indycar existed outside of indianapolis or that they were racing in Las Vegas.

Back 15 to 20 years ago, even in Nascar country in the deep south, people knew who Mario Andretti, Danny Sullivan, Al Unser jr, Nigel Mansell, Emmo Fittipaldi, Rick Mears, Bobby Rahal, etc were. They were common, known household names and the TV audience back then was nearly 10 times the size it is now.

The sole identity that anyone in the general public would know now is danica patrick and she is gone to Nascar.

[kurski]

SPEED.com has learned that veteran Oriol Servia is all but signed and sealed for the 2012 IZOD IndyCar season with Dennis Reinbold and Robbie Buhl.

[racer69]

Originally Posted by Jacques Rabbit

With all due respect, the Americans will only support American drivers theory has never actually been proven to be accurate.

Until my visit to the 500 last May , i had never appreciated just how popular amongst the race-going fans that Kanaan (particularly) and Castroneves were. During the race at Turn 4, Kanaan was easily getting to most cheers during the race, he seemed to be THE fan favourite.

The biggest cheer from the crowd in my area though, funnily enough (and proving your point very true), was when Bertrand Baguette overtook Danica Patrick for the lead.... it gave me an insight into how UNpopular Danica was with the race-going fans...

[Down F0rce]

I'll be at turn 4 for my first 500 this year... looking forward to it!

I can understand why Kanaan is popular among fans. It's as if he's inherited the Andretti curse; he always runs up at the front before something goes wrong.

[Peat]

http://www.autosport.com/news/report.php/id/96930

Hinch gets the Go Daddy ride!

Good news.

[Down F0rce]

Originally Posted by Canada ALMS fan

^Wow!!! Even if they sold those for pennies on the dollar that is still a ton of capital tied up, even though sponsors paid for them. Surely a couple must have some collector value??

Is US BOSS still around? Might be seeing a fair few Dallara's racing if so...

[Jacques Rabbit]

Would have loved to have seen Servi�* land a better ride, but at least he has something. Most of my favorite drivers are with Lotus now, so I have to hope that their engine isn't a liability (I know it's the lightest one by far, but still no clarity on how IndyCar is going to deal with that). Also hope it's reliable, since Indy are/were looking at raising the rev limit to bring lap times back up if I've read correctly, so that might mean a return of engines not lasting an entire race.

On another note, and maybe I just missed it in the Wilson/Pappas announcement and everyone else knew, Dale Coyne Racing is with Honda.

[W.A Trichlorostyrene]

Originally Posted by Jacques Rabbit

Would have loved to have seen Servi�* land a better ride, but at least he has something. Most of my favorite drivers are with Lotus now, so I have to hope that their engine isn't a liability (I know it's the lightest one by far, but still no clarity on how IndyCar is going to deal with that).

You're not the only one, my favorites are mostly on Lotus too

Sure Servia deserved much better, but who knows? After all Wilson had a few flashes of speed with DRR in 2010(pole and led a big part of the race at Toronto ie).

Also hope it's reliable, since Indy are/were looking at raising the rev limit to bring lap times back up if I've read correctly, so that might mean a return of engines not lasting an entire race.

When you think of the amount of chassis breakers in the field at the moment... If we also put mechanical failures into the equation, ouch! That won't make many people crossing the finish line that

[GTRMagic]

Originally Posted by Jacques Rabbit

On another note, and maybe I just missed it in the Wilson/Pappas announcement and everyone else knew, Dale Coyne Racing is with Honda.

Here although no official announcement yet it seems...

Great news for this small team... I wonder who might take the second seat there? Maybe Mr Jakes & Mr Bourdais will split it... or could Mr Tracy, and his apparent Canadian Honda support help take over the car alongside Mr Wilson?

[W.A Trichlorostyrene]

Originally Posted by GTRMagic

Here although no official announcement yet it seems...

Taken from DCR's facebook:

Just wanted to let everyone know that we have not signed Justin Wilson as of yet, but we are working on it. We are pleased to announce that Bill Pappas is coming aboard to work with us in 2012. Stayed tuned for more updates.

Surely this is only a matter of time before we see the formal announcement, they wouldn't have used this kind of formulation if this wasn't an almost-done deal.

Great news for this small team... I wonder who might take the second seat there? Maybe Mr Jakes & Mr Bourdais will split it... or could Mr Tracy, and his apparent Canadian Honda support help take over the car alongside Mr Wilson?

Wilson and SeaBass, what a killer combo that would be... Watch out Roger and Chip

Don't know about PT, I'd love to see it happen too, but AFAIK a full season ride was one of Honda Canada's conditions for their support...